The text aims to describe the process by which the Nicaraguan political system has turned into and become consolidated as a hybrid regime, with the municipal elections of the 4th of November 2012 identified as a key episode. With this aim in mind the text is divided into four sections. The first presents the country's economic and social situation as well as the strategies of Ortega's government to alleviate poverty via focalized social policy. The second section shows the process by which democratic institutions have eroded and the disappearance of horizontal and vertical accountability through the transformations in legality, political cooptation of the State's autonomies bodies, and the opaque municipal elections of 2008 and 2011. The next section focuses on the municipal elections of 2012, in terms of their organization, the electoral campaigns, election day itself, and the final outcome. Last, the fourth section offers some theoretical conclusions about Nicaragua's political life, as a result of the information offered in the text
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